A Sydney woman spent a year ignoring a condition that made her stop breathing every two minutes while she slept.

Fiona Bond, from Belrose in the Northern Beaches, suffered from severe snoring - a symptom of sleep apnea - but did not think much of it until she drove a barn-full of 14 people outside because it was so loud.

For a year, the 55-year-old said her undiagnosed condition - which causes people to stop breathing during sleep - was 'ruining her life'.

Fiona Bond (pictured right with her partner) suffers from sleep apnea and was left undiagnosed for a year

'I started getting a terrible tiredness and I would get up in the morning and didn't feel refreshed and didn't feel like I slept at all,' she told Daily Mail Australia.

'I sort of stopped breathing in my sleep and then jump and wake myself up.

'Literally 10 minutes after I got up in the morning I wanted to go back to bed. Throughout the day, I could be sitting somewhere and fall asleep.

'Because I was so tired my head was kind of foggy all the time and I could not concentrate very well and my memory wasn't good.'

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Ms Bond was so exhausted that she feared getting behind the wheel of a car for more than 10 minutes, just in case she fell asleep.

But unfortunately her story is not unique.

New research has found one of two Australia women aged between 20 to 70 years old living with sleep apnea often remain undiagnosed or are diagnosed with other conditions.

The study done by sleep medicine research scientist Dr Carmel Harrington - the author of The Complete Guide to a Good Night's Sleep - also showed 77 per cent of Australian women were exhausted and unknowingly putting themselves at risk of chronic health conditions.

These conditions include type 2 diabetes, depression and cardiovascular disease.

But Ms Bond's story is not unique as new research has found one in two Australian women are living with sleep apnea and do not know it

'We do know from scientific research that women require 20 to 30 minutes more sleep than men,' Dr Harrington said.

'That doesn't sound like a whole lot but... if you're constantly not getting enough sleep for an entire month you'll feel exhausted by the middle of the day.'

Dr Harrington said her research also showed almost twice as many women were experiencing more headaches in the morning than men, and this indicated they were not getting enough sleep or they were living with an undiagnosed sleep condition.

'A lot of women do admit to snoring which is a sign of sleep apnea but about one in eight women denied they were snoring and 15 per cent of them were embarrassed to do anything about it,' she said.

'Bottom line is it's not normal to feel exhausted and not meet the challenges of the day.

'You either need more sleep and if you aren't, your mental well-being will suffer.

'Prioritise it with nutrition and exercise, but often we don't do that.'

The study done by sleep medicine research scientist Dr Carmel Harrington also showed 77 per cent of Australian women were exhausted and unknowingly putting themselves at risk of chronic health conditions

And Ms Bond is a prime example of this research as she denied that anything was wrong for a long time.

Her severe snoring was first brought to her attention when her daughter recorded her sleep when she got fed up with hearing her mother snoring from her bedroom on the other side of the house.

'We all kind of thought it was funny,' Ms Bond said.

'She said my snoring was so loud and I thought it was rubbish.

'It didn't really bother me... I just thought you get to this age and everyone starts snoring.'

But a trip to Italy sparked Ms Bond to seek help.

She and her partner were staying in a barn during a pilgrimage with 12 other people.

'I woke up probably 4am in the morning and the whole room was empty,' Ms Bond said.

'I got up, went outside and people were sleeping on the ground.

'When I asked them why they were there they said "Fiona was snoring so loudly no one could sleep". I was so loud I cleared the barn.'

A few months after she returned to Australia, Ms Bond finally sought advice from her doctor who sent her to get a sleep study done.

Ms Bond (third from the left) did not seek help for her condition until after a trip to Italy where she drove a barn-full of people outside because her snoring was too loud

The study on her sleeping pattern found she was waking up every two minutes during her night's rest.

'That's why I was so worn out and my body was not getting any rest,' Ms Bond said.

'It can affect your mind...and that sort of dawned on me how dangerous it was if I just kept going.

'When [my specialist] did diagnose [my sleep apnea], I just couldn't believe it. I was just over the moon.'

Since she got a CPAP machine which helps open her throat during sleep, Ms Bond said she felt like 'a different person within a few days'.

'I woke up in the morning and started bouncing out of bed again... and I would get through the whole day and not think of sleep once. It was amazing,' she said.

The treatment from the machine was so effective, Ms Bond said her specialist told her she was sleeping like a 20-year-old.

Ms Bond encourage women who had similar concerns to what she had experienced to seek help.

'I know a few women who have been diagnosed and won't do anything about it and they don't know what a better quality of life they would have,' she said.

'They think it's not a lot but it's not good to keep going through life like that your quality of life is not like that anymore.'